Textures are at the heart of my pastries, since the crunchy or creamy sensation in the mouth is the first perception of taste. I approach the making of a cake with sensuality, delicacy and sometimes humour. The “Stanislas” baba, for instance, initially feels like baba in the mouth, but then the filling and the cake fuse so that their textures become equivalent, each as important and elegant as the other. This cake required more than a year of research to realise this idea of textures that do not compete but instead prolong the pleasure in the mouth.

My reference point is in fact vanilla ice cream, which I constantly explore, abandon and rediscover, and that serves as the base for my taste in pastry and ice creams. Textures allow me to create stages in the tasting of a cake, stages which lead to a final flavour that is the heart of my creation. Finally, I never stop recreating vanilla cream…